


Sound & Color

by luckycharms



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Rock Band, Band Fic, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Music, Slow Burn, Sort Of, i guess they're a rock band
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-27
Updated: 2017-08-22
Packaged: 2018-12-18 12:46:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,076
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11874786
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/luckycharms/pseuds/luckycharms
Summary: The up and coming rock band, Voltron, just lost their guitarist and are looking for a replacement.





	Sound & Color

“We’re never gonna find another one.”

Lance and Hunk were sitting in a booth at their favorite bar, drinking beer and mourning. They were two fifths—two fourths—of the up and coming band, Voltron. And their guitarist had quit exactly 72 hours ago. Shiro and Pidge were busy posting more ads around town for a new guitarist, while Allura sat down and canceled their upcoming gigs until further notice. 

“C’mon, man we just gotta stay positive. I mean we’ve hardly looked! And not all of those guys at the auditions yesterday totally sucked?”

Lance fixes Hunk with a glare. They held their first auditions the day before and Lance still had a headache. “Hunk, they were so bad, Pidge’s cat started meowing back.” 

“So? Maybe we could start selling to cats. We could get sponsored by Purina!” Lance laughs at Hunk’s optimism. In all honesty they were totally fucked. Great guitar players didn’t just fall from the—

“Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for joining us. Come back next week for our open mic. Until then, our last performance of the night: Keith Kogane.” The MC hops off the stage as a guy with long, black hair tied back and a red electric strapped to his chest steps up to the microphone.

“Uh, hi, I’m Keith. Yeah.” The guy takes a seat on a stool at the center of the stage, as a few chords from a recording start to play in the background. He closes his eyes and begins plucking the guitar, bopping and shaking his head as he plays his cool, psychedelic solo. The chatter of the bar grows silent. All their attention drawn to the music and its creator. The warm orange and red glow of the stage lights illuminate his relaxed face, focused in on his music. 

Lance and Hunk look at each other from across the table, both their eyes wide. 

When he finishes his performance, and the echo from the sound system dies out, he gets deafening applause from the bar patrons. He opens his eyes for the first time during the whole performance.

“Thank you,” he says into the microphone, smiling only a little bit, quickly gets off the stage and heads into the back. Lance and Hunk are up before the door closes, chasing the killer guitarist with the same thought on their minds. They make their way through the back, dodging questioning bar staff until they find the guitarist in the sound room with his hair down, tucking his guitar into it’s case. He turns his head as Lance and Hunk enter the room.

“Um, can I help you?” he asks suspiciously as he snaps his guitar case shut. 

“As a matter of fact, you can,” Lance says, extending his hand towards the confused performer. “Keith was it?”

“Yeah…?” He hesitantly shakes Lance’s hand, glancing from him to Hunk.

“I’m Lance and this is Hunk,” he says gesturing to his friend, who waves a little. “We happen to be looking for a new guitarist. You really killed it up there.”

“Oh, I know who you are. You’re from that band Voltron, right?”

“Yeah! So you’ve heard of us?” Lance grins.

“I guess you could say that.”

“So what do you say? Wanna join our band?”

“Sorry, I’m kind of already in one. The Empire, actually.”

Lance’s jaw drops and Hunk lets out a little gasp. The Empire were their sworn rivals. Ever since they kicked their asses at a local battle-of-the-bands, when Voltron had clearly deserved it, then proceeded to kindly rub it in their faces. Each band had then made it their sworn duty to fuck with the other, competing with sales and popularity. So far The Empire was winning. But no one would admit it. 

“You play for The Empire?! What a waste of talent!” Lance shouts and throws his arms out. Keith glares at him.

“Lance…” Hunk whisper-scolds his friend.

“Come on, dude! The Empire are just a bunch of assholes! How much are they paying you?”

Keith rolls his eyes at Lance, “Look, I’m not gonna join your band. Could you move?” He pushes past Lance and Hunk, guitar case in hand, and heads out the back door.

Hunk sighs, “It’s okay, dude, we can find anoth—“

“Hunk! We need that guy for Voltron. He kills at guitar! He could be our chance to get really good!” Lance says, grabbing Hunk’s cheeks.

“Well, he seems pretty dead set on The Empire…” Hunk says, his cheeks squished.

“Ugh, The Empire ruins everything for us! Let’s get back to Pidge’s, I think I have an idea.”

 

“You want to do what?” Pidge says from her oversized beanbag nest.

After the bar, Lance and Hunk called everyone back to Pidge’s apartment-turned-studio. They all sat around their practice room, sound proofed to avoid angry neighbors, and listened to Lance tell them about the guitarist from the open mic. 

“I’m telling you this guy is too incredible to let go! We have to get him to join Voltron, so we gotta find him at an Empire concert,” Lance says standing in the middle of their circle. 

“What’s his name?” Allura asks while typing at her laptop.

“Um…something with a K…Kenny? Shit, Hunk?”

“I don’t know. I was too afraid he was gonna stab you to remember,” Hunk says while petting Pidge’s cat, Rover, on the floor.

“Lance, this is a terrible idea. We’d literally be giving our enemy money. Do you know how many Empire fans would very much like to shank us? Not to mention the band itself. We can’t go to one of their concerts, it’s suicide!” Pidge says, rubbing her temples.

“Their fans are too pussy to try and shank us, Pidge. The most they could do is write rude shit about us on their weird blogs. We’re going.”

“Ugh! Shiro?” Pidge groans and looks to Shiro for help. 

“I think it’s worth a shot,” he says shrugging from behind his drum set.

“What!? Shiro, this is crazy!” Pidge exclaims trying to sit up in her beanbag.

“If this guy really is as good as Lance and Hunk say he is,” Shiro says walking around the set to the center of the room, “then it’s more crazy to let him go. For the good of the band. We can at least see if he’s worth the trouble.” 

Pidge groans and Lance shouts, “Yes! Trust me you guys, you won’t be disappointed. All we have to is convince him.” 

 

If he’s being honest, an Empire concert is the very last thing Shiro expected himself to be doing. The crowd here is completely different than any of Voltron’s. Most of them look like they could kill him. The concert is in a small underground venue that smells like cigarettes and piss, with dim, purple lighting. When Voltron sneaks in, the opening act is busy hyping up the crowd. They sound raw and ugly, which, of course can be good, but Shiro thinks his brain is melting out of his ears. 

“I think I’m gonna puke,” Hunk mumbles, clutching his stomach at the scene.

They all grab drinks from the bar and try to stick together in case someone recognizes them. Lance wears glasses and his jacket’s hood, the frontman of a band being easily recognizable to anyone. As they make their way through the crowd to get a better view, the singer on stage rips his shirt in a fit of musical passion as the final chorus to the song ends. They thank the mild roar of the venue, and leave the stage so The Empire can make their way on. The crowd is absolutely buzzing in anticipation, pushing and smoking and chanting. Lance grabs onto Hunk’s arm. Shiro hopes this guy Lance and Hunk were talking about is as good as they said. That drunk guy to his left was giving him a weird look. Suddenly the crowd explodes in screams as the band members walk onto the stage. People grab at their feet and throw several articles of clothing on stage. Zarkon, The Empire’s drummer, takes his place on a raised platform at the very center behind a huge set with the band’s logo painted on the front. That was the set he stole from Shiro’s van last year. It had really sucked trying to get a new one. The bassist, Sendak, takes his place on the right of their singer, Haggar, whose rough voice sounded like nails on a chalkboard to Shiro. The guitarist they were here for is last to join the rest of the band onstage and…wait. Holy shit.

“WE ARE THE EMPIRE, WE ARE THE FUTURE! 1,2,3,4!” 

Over the blasting bass and deafening drum beat, Shiro hears Keith Kogane, from a tiny town in Ohio Shiro left behind five years ago, absolutely shredding a bright, cherry red guitar. His long hair is tied back at the bottom of his head, his eyes closed and a blissed out look on his face. Shiro’s mouth gapes as he watches Keith bend his body to the will of the music, his dark bangs already beginning to stick to his forehead and a flush spreading over his cheeks. Suddenly Shiro thinks that maybe The Empire’s music isn’t so bad. 

Pidge looks at Shiro to see his eyes and mouth wide open, a metal hand frozen pushing back his white forelock. “Shiro? You doin’ okay?” she shouts over the music, nudging him out of this state of shock. 

“What? Yeah, yeah, I’m okay! I know him,” Shiro shouts back and gestures to Keith, who has moved onto the second song in the set, hair starting to fall out of it’s ponytail. 

“No shit! Hey guys!” Pidge shouts to the rest of their friends, who all have similar looks of awe at the guitarist busting out an incredible riff. “Shiro knows him!” Lance, Hunk, and Allura all turn their heads toward Shiro.  
“Really? Dude, you gotta talk to him after!” Lance says as the song ends and the band on stage breaks before the next one. Shiro watches Keith down half a water bottle. Both of them gulp. 

“I will,” he says as the drum beat to the next song picks up. 

Keith really was mesmerizing on stage. Shiro watched him let himself get carried away with the music, nodding his head along and putting all his focus into his instrument. He remembers a younger, frustrated Keith clutching an old, battered acoustic with Shiro’s name on it, complaining about some song he just couldn’t grasp. Now, Keith was in his element. He looked and sounded perfect up on stage, passion filling every note he played. His energy never faltered throughout the entire set, even long after his hair had fallen out of it’s place and was plastered to his neck and flushed cheeks. As the final song ends, Shiro watches Keith pant heavily with his head tilted towards the ceiling, and then make his way offstage while Haggar thanks the crowd. Shiro’s legs were moving to where Keith went before he realized. With his size and his arm and scars, Shiro manages to intimidate people out of his way. He finds Keith, after a few minutes of searching the backstage hallway, alone in a sort of dressing room, toweling off his hair and packing his guitar away in it’s case.

“Keith.” He freezes and brings the towel to his chest in a death grip. He knows that voice. He could never completely forget it. Keith turns around slowly to see Takashi Shirogane standing only a few feet away from him. He pales and stares at a living ghost. “Hey,” Shiro says awkwardly, stuffing one hand in his pocket and the other—a metal prosthetic—gives a slight wave. Keith says nothing, just blinks at the guy he was convinced was dead for three years. “Um, you were really incredible up there. You’ve gotten so good, heh. I mean really, I couldn’t believe I was watching you getting so into it.” What Shiro really couldn’t believe was that he was actually talking to Keith right now. But he wasn’t responding. “Keith, I know I, um, kind of literally disappeared and I’m really sorry for never saying anything, but…look, my band is looking for a new guitarist and I think it would be a really great way to, y’know, catch up and be—“

“Fuck you, Shiro.” 

Shiro looks up from his rambling to see Keith, red with tears in his eyes. He gets a sweaty towel thrown at his chest as Keith swiftly turns, slams his case shut, and bolts out the door, right past a stunned Shiro. 

 

Shiro gets out of there after effectively losing Keith and receiving suspicious side glances from various backstage staff. He finds his friends huddled around the bar and tells them that Keith got away.

“What do you mean ‘he got away’?” Lance asks from his perch on a barstool.

“I mean he literally ran away from me. I’m pretty sure he left the building.”

“Well, did he say anything to you?” Allura asks, furrowing her brow.

“Besides ‘fuck you’, no he didn’t say anything,” Shiro sighs.

“Shit,” Lance groans.

 

The band regroups at Pidge’s, thoroughly defeated with several rounds of Taco Bell. 

“Fucking Empire,” Lance grumbles around a mouthful of Doritos Locos Taco™, “ruining everything. Bet they knew we needed a new guitarist so they snatched up the best guy in the city.” 

“I can’t believe people like their music,” Hunk says, trying to keep his quesadilla away from Rover. “I mean, without Keith it could barely be considered that.”

“Come on guys, not everyone has the same tastes. Just appreciate it as an art form,” Shiro tries. He’s still on a strange high from seeing Keith up on stage. Just from seeing Keith in general. It’s like a hole was ripped in the universe and Keith stepped through from another dimension. That would be a good song lyric. Shiro writes it down on a yellow pad lying around. 

“I don’t have to appreciate art made by a couple of dick holes,” Lance says.

“Did you just call them dick holes?” Pidge asks with mild sauce on her chin.

“Maybe I did! Those dick holes with their shitty, cult fans and their tacky purple merch and their really good asshole guitar player,” Lance grumbles again sinking further into one of Pidge’s beanbags. 

“Allura, have you had any luck finding him?” Pidge asks. 

“Ugh, no. He’s like a ghost. The only mention of him I can find is on The Empire’s website,” she says clacking away at her laptop with her long, pink nails. 

“Don’t worry guys. Even if it’s not Keith we will find a replacement. But we gotta keep practicing, even without guitar,” Shiro says, but he can’t help but hope they find him and somehow convince Keith to join.

 

The second day of auditions was even worse than the last, further lowering the band’s mood. They decided a good jam session was in order and hopped into Shiro’s van to go to Pidge’s. They all took up their instruments: Pidge at her various keyboards and synthesizers, Hunk on bass, Lance ready with lyrics, and Shiro starting a beat on his black drum set, a painted lion staring out from the face of the bass drum. It felt good to just lose himself in the beat, improvising along with his talented friends, making music together. Keith had surrounded Shiro. It felt like every thought he had just turned into Keith. At first he thought he was suffocating; the thought of someone from his hometown finding him just set him off, after he tried so hard to get away from it all. But the more he thought about him, he realized how glad he was to see Keith after all these years. He hadn’t thought about him in forever. Shiro missed his presence in his mind. But right now, Shiro focused on his music, letting Keith fall away from his train of thought, even though it would have been great to have as good a guitar player as he is for this practice session. 

After their quick warm up the band starts practicing their songs and a couple covers. A few times Shiro has to step in with a spare guitar to help figure some things out. He thinks about giving Keith guitar lessons back in high school. He taught him how to play every song he wanted to and when he really got it, Shiro would play back up guitar or just give him a beat to play with. Keith loved it when Shiro learned the drum part to one of his favorite songs and surprised him with it. He couldn’t believe that because of him, Keith is still playing guitar, for a well-known band nonetheless. He feels proud. Shit, okay, focus. While they practice, Allura takes plenty of pictures to post on their social media and website. They all come together and share new song ideas, Lance taking their lyrics and helping figure out the melody, then they just go with it. Shiro is so grateful for his friends. They all make an amazing team, working so well together, no imbalance in power, just making music. Around eleven the energy in the room starts dying, but they haven’t finished working through a newer song that needs cleaning, so Shiro offers to make a coffee run.

A small, 24-hour, local coffee shop greets him like a beacon in the night, so he pulls up in his van to the empty roadside. Walking in, he doesn’t know how he didn’t see outside, that standing bored with red ear buds in behind a counter, was Keith in a black apron. He doesn’t look up from his phone when Shiro walks in, so he goes up to the counter. Keith glances up and jumps back, startled.

“Jesus! Do you always sneak up on people?” Keith shouts. It’s the first thing he’s said to him in five years that didn’t involve ‘fuck’ and ‘you’.

“Well, you’re the one wearing ear buds on the job. Not a great business tactic. Especially if you don’t want people scaring you,” Shiro smirks. 

Keith groans and takes his ear buds out. “What are you doing here, Shiro.”

“Well, I don’t know about you but I usually go to coffee shops to get coffee.” Keith groans again. “But I’m glad I ran into you. I’m sorry for scaring you at the concert the other night—and for scaring you just now. I don’t know why I thought it would go well.”

“Y’know, you should really be fucking apologizing for dropping off the face of the earth for five fucking years,” Keith says, crossing his arms and glaring at Shiro. 

“You’re right. I’m sorry, Keith.” Keith drops his gaze from Shiro’s face, looking at the floor instead. He couldn’t stand that sincere look he was getting. “And I’d be more than willing to explain it all to you sometime.” Shiro grabs a napkin and pen from the counter, and writes down his number, handing it to a confused Keith. “Let me know if you want to talk,” with that, Shiro gives one last look at Keith holding his number in his hand, looking like he’d seen a ghost, and walks out. He’ll just get some Red Bull. 

 

Keith had watched Shiro’s back as he disappeared from the shop, and even after his shift had ended, he couldn’t get his stupid, hopeful face out of his head. Now, he sat in his car, light on, and stared at Shiro’s phone number in blue ink. He almost tore it up as soon as Shiro had left. Funny. He had almost done the same with Shiro’s guitar when he left the first time. The little ‘Shiro’ underneath his number looked exactly like the one etched into the body of the acoustic back at his apartment. This was crazy. He felt like he was in high school again: seeing Shiro, thinking about Shiro, playing guitar for Shiro, watching Shiro leave. Keith pinches his arm and sighs. He ‘s not dreaming, but he must be out of his goddamn mind.

“I must be out of my goddamn mind,” he whispers to no one and pulls out his phone to send a text to Shiro:

it’s keith

He puts his phone down and hurries home, blatantly ignoring the buzz of a notification, because if he thinks about Shiro, he’s going to crash his car. Even when he’s safe inside his apartment he tries to forget about it, but after a solid two minutes of distracting himself he snatches his phone from the kitchen counter and runs into his room.

shiro: hey so would you maybe wanna meet up somewhere tomorrow?

Keith closes his eyes. Things were always okay when he closed his eyes. But things weren’t okay. He was back in his old room, in his parent’s house, crying over a version of Shiro who had been missing for a week, gone without a trace. Keith was being ridiculous. It was just one text. From a guy who never died. 

sure

shiro: breakfast at that one diner on the corner of main?

okay 

shiro: great, see you tomorrow 

Keith tosses his phone to the side and falls down on his bed, staring up at the ceiling. He was eighteen again. And missing Shiro.

 

Shiro arrives the next day at the classic looking diner Keith said he would meet him at. A retro jukebox sits in the back corner playing an old Sam Cooke song. Keith sits next to it in a booth, a hand tucked under his chin, looking out the window. Shiro walks up to him (stepping a little loudly) and Keith looks up at him.

“You look like you’re taking part in some kind of suspicious business way back here,” Shiro teases. To his relief, a little smile quirks at Keith’s lips. Shiro takes in a shaky breath and sits across from Keith. “Ha, there you go. I missed that smile.”

Keith’s face falls and he leans back against the seat. “Five years, Takashi,” he sighs. Shiro loses his breath at his name. Keith’s dark blue eyes bore into Shiro. He feels like the stars would fall from them if he cried. That’d be a good lyric. Shiro’s writing an entire song about Keith by the time he says, “I stopped looking after two.” Shiro’s heart breaks. 

“I’m sorry. Keith, I—“

“Hi there, welcome to Lynn’s. Are you guys ready to order?” a waitress holding a notepad interrupts him. 

“Just coffee and a croissant for me, thank you,” Keith says and hands her his menu.

“Uh, the same for me. And can I borrow your pen for a sec?” The waitress gives him a look but hands over her pen. Shiro writes a few lines of lyric on a napkin and hands it back to her.

Keith huffs out a laugh. “Still writing songs on napkins, Shiro?” Shiro grins at Keith, folds up the napkin and tucks it into his pocket. 

“I find napkins are the best medium for creativity,” he jokes, getting another small laugh out of Keith. But then their eyes meet, and neither looks away while both their smiles slowly fall.

“Why did you leave, Shiro?”

Keith knows there was supposed to be a ‘me’ tucked into his question—hopes to god that Shiro doesn’t. Keith frustratingly blinks away any tears that try to break through. He doesn’t look away from Shiro.

Shiro sighs. “Keith, I was dying in that town. I—I was so tired of living. Just existing. Every day just felt the same as the last. I felt like a caged animal and my family didn’t help. They were always shoving their expectations down my throat—I was never good enough for them, Keith. They would never listen to me. So, I thought that if I just left it all behind I would be better off. I dropped out of college, took all my stuff, and tried to find some place to be happy. Keith, I realized that it wasn’t really the place with the problem—it was me. I was depressed. And I tried to run away but everything just caught up with me. I got better though and I kept playing music and I found this city—but if I ever went back I knew it would just come right back to me.”

“Did you ever once think how I felt?!” Keith snaps from across the table. “Shiro, I thought you were dead for five years. They confirmed you missing after a week and—and I just couldn’t fucking handle it! I stopped going to class, I—I took all of my shit and I left my parents to go and find you, Shiro, the only people in this world who never fucking abandoned me. I lived in my car for two years because—because I thought there was still some chance you might be alive because I was just so—so—“ Keith cuts himself off, a few tears running down his red cheeks. He wipes at his eyes and stares at the ceiling. Keith knows what he was about to say. He was so in love with Shiro back then. And now he’s digging up all these old feelings for a dead guy, all he wished he could have said.

“Keith, I was always thinking about you. You were the hardest thing I had to let go. But I had to let go of everything if I wanted to get better. If I hadn’t done any of this, I would be miserable.” Keith finally looks at him, and he was right: the stars did fall from his eyes. Keith was his best friend; but, he had to leave it all behind. Keith’s silence creates a void he desperately tries to fill, “My phone got stolen early on, and I didn’t get a new one until I landed this job doing construction work. There was this crazy accident and I ended up losing my arm, which sucked and set me back months until I got fitted for my prosthetic. I started doing music lessons—guitar and drums. Then I met Lance and Hunk and Pidge and Allura and we just, started a band without really thinking. I finally realized I was happy when I was with them and we were just making music. I quit the construction job, cause I knew that music was my life and it was what I needed to do.” 

Keith suddenly smiles a tiny bit, his eyes watery, and Shiro is blown away. “You do music lessons?”

“Y—yeah. Fitting isn’t it?” They both think of Keith’s lessons with Shiro, long nights practicing, ending with callused fingers and shared beds. Then Keith remembers the lonelier nights after he disappeared. 

“…You never thought about coming back?”

“I wanted to, but I couldn’t let myself, Keith. I knew going back would have killed me,” Shiro sighs. “I’m sorry, Keith.”

He knows he maybe shouldn’t let this go; he shouldn’t forgive Shiro so easily, but it’s hard when he’s missed him for so long and he finally gets to see his face and hear his voice again. It really kills him to know what Shiro went through. 

The waitress brings out their coffee and croissants, a knowing, polite look on her face. They’ll tip her extra.

Stirring cream and sugar into his coffee, Keith breaks the silence. “Remember when I came over to your house and you let me play your guitar for the very first time?”

“You were so bad,” Shiro laughs. “But then I showed you a few chords and you wouldn’t stop playing them.” He remembers that amateur Keith fondly. 

“Ha, yeah,” Keith says. “You know, I still have that guitar? The one with your name on it?” 

Shiro smiles. “Really?”

Keith returns the smile. “Really.”

They do catch up. They talk about their time on the road, driving away from their hometown. They talk about practicing and getting better over the years, making music by themselves and joining bands. Concerts, bars, radio stations, changing music tastes, albums, odd jobs. As the hours pass by in the diner, time fades between them. Keith lets himself be happy to see Shiro again. Shiro hadn’t thought about Keith for a while, but he’s glad to see his friend again and can’t believe how proud he is to hear about all he’s been doing.

“If it wasn’t for you, my life would have been a lot different.” 

Shiro feels a little guilty and proud at Keith’s comment. Keith was here because of him, but he had also become a great guitar player.

“So, how is working with The Empire? They’re a pretty talented group,” Shiro asks long after their coffee mugs have emptied. 

“Yeah, they’re good, I guess, but um,” he looks around like someone might be listening, “they’re all kind of assholes. I mean, just, constant fighting. And their drummer, Zarkon? Power hungry. Practice is honestly the worst time of day for me,” Keith wrinkles his nose a little and laughs. “Their music isn’t even really in my taste. Oh, um, by the way, I listened to your guys’ stuff online a little bit after the concert. I liked them--everyone sounds so good.”

“Haha, thanks. If you ever want to drop in on a rehearsal you’re more than welcome to. And there’s always a place in Voltron for you. They’re all really nice people who just want to, y’know, make good, enjoyable music.”

“I’ll, um. I’ll think about it.”

They pay their bill, leaving a very generous tip for all the shouting and time they spent, and make their way out of the diner. The sun outside is warm on their faces.

“We should hang out again,” Shiro says suddenly. He had a good time with Keith, reminiscing and relearning about his friend. He’d missed out on so much, and he just wants to know more about Keith. 

“Yeah. We should.” Shiro doesn’t think he’ll ever get tired of seeing Keith smile. He pulls him in for a hug that lasts a little bit too long, but they both could care less. “Bye,” Keith says looking up at Shiro in his arms, then stepping away.

“Bye.” Shiro watches Keith turn and walk away from him, thinking he must have done something really good to deserve this.

**Author's Note:**

> work title: https://youtu.be/nc5ZrkHbTgc  
> chapter title: https://youtu.be/wycjnCCgUes  
> Keith's solo inspiration: https://youtu.be/UhGaGSJzR58  
> for the opening act I just pictured like really edgy punk or metal or like idk weird ska and then the same for The Empire except more like the Cranberries maybe cuz theyre supposed to be better idk. also this isn't like a personal hatred for any type of music i'm super into just like all music in general so don't look into it   
> what I like to imagine Voltron + Lance singing sounds like because I love this song: https://youtu.be/ml6-cGacI-Q  
> what Keith is listening to because this song is good and he's sad or som shit: https://youtu.be/t9eWowko2Fc   
> the Sam Cooke song(s): https://youtu.be/gZB4jcPmFGo https://youtu.be/yAvJ6cxMrg0 https://youtu.be/CizmrHgmLvU
> 
> this is my first fic really and I dont do much like creative writing anymore so this probably sucks a little bit. I really like this AU so i just thought I'd write my own since I read all the others i could find lol. i might go back later and just fix all my mistakes and idk if i'll keep adding chapters unless y'all like it


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